An email from a reader: “How can I control my ejaculation ….
…..I don’t even look forward to having sex because I’m so self-conscious about coming so fast. In fact, I have begun to avoid dating because I’m afraid that eventually things will become intimate and my date will expect intercourse…only to be disappointed.
“It’s totally embarrassing. At this point I would gladly forgo any orgasms of my own if I could make love long enough to please my partner. I can masturbate for hours without ejaculating, but only seconds during the real thing. Please, any help would be greatly appreciated.”
Our answer:
I agree, premature ejaculation can actually start to deter you from creating meaningful relationships. And loss of self-confidence has a major role in performance in bed. You need to control your ejaculation before you become confident – once you feel confident, you can go on for longer.
So how’s it done? To control premature ejaculation one method is the “squeeze technique” technique, it is a method of squeezing below the glans during an erection so that you slightly lose your erection, and then start again.
This can be done alone, to train yourself to go longer, or if you believe it is an anxiety issue, can be done with your girlfriend present. And if she doesn’t have a problem with it, how about just enjoying lovemaking more than once?
If you find none of those stop PE, there are some prescription solutions that your doctor can provide. The most useful is taking a small dose of antidepressants.
These drugs often have the side effect of delaying ejaculation sometimes to the point of being unable to ejaculate at all (which frustrates users). You can just adjust the dose till you find a happy medium. This solution has been shown to work in a large number of men.
Taking Viagra has been successful for some men, in that even if you ejaculate too quickly you can still remain erect and try again.
Another alternative is a prescription drug called paroxetine that works combined with Viagra. It works in around 80% of cases but has some potentially unpleasant side-effects.
It improves most men’s ejaculation times from about 30 seconds to 5 minutes. However, you must ask if this drug, which is very similar to Prozac, is a good way to stop PE. You may prefer to find the cause rather than just treating the symptoms.
It is pretty common for a man to ejaculate very quickly during his first encounter or two with a new partner…especially in the early stages of his dating career.
It takes time and practice to mature in the bedroom. (Sometimes I even wonder if many of the guys who never seem to be able to commit to one partner, might not just be guys who never matured their technique enough to be confident with the same woman.)
Anyway, you have to understand that total lovemaking is not merely the act of sexual intercourse.
If you have a problem stopping rapid ejaculation before your woman has had an orgasm, then you just have to make sure that you bring her to orgasm in other ways, before you enter her and ejaculate.
Maybe the idea that she has already been pleasured will take the stress off your mind, so that you can relax and enjoy a longer time inside her.
If not, that will still be all right because she’s already been taken care of, and she will probably get a thrill out of your quick burst of passion anyway!
Premature ejaculation is the most common male sexual complaint. Of course any man will ejaculate too soon if he is excited enough. But really chronic PE is characterized by a constant inability to delay climax. No one really knows why this happens.
Some speculate it’s hypersensitive nerves, an over-sensitive penis, or some chemical imbalance. What is clear is that it doesn’t usually clear up by itself, it’s hard to control, and it can become quite debilitating.
Until I dealt with my own PE I had always been a fairly rapid ejaculator. I could last a long time with masturbation and foreplay but when it came to intercourse I had to really work to control myself.
Now I think that when I was making love in the man on top position, the muscles in my groin and buttocks were very tense and that caused an immediate sensation that I wanted to ejaculate.
And it is true that relaxing these muscles does remove pressure on your penis, pelvic area, and prostate and causes a reduction of over-stimulation.
I could be in my partner and not moving and still feel a pressure to ejaculate building up. Any kind of thrusting made it very hard to wait. Being on the bottom was definitely better because that feeling wasn’t as strong.
One of my friends admitted to me once he couldn’t control his ejaculation before he entered his partner. In the end he stopped premature ejaculation by using a really thick condom. He said when he you felt the need to “take a break”, it was the perfect time to do cunnilingus or sensual play to satisfy his girl.
Of course, one possibility is that performance anxiety is causing your premature ejaculation. The average duration before male orgasm is considerably less than 6 minutes in even experienced lovers.
Talk to your partner and see what comes up: for example, let her know that you will have a quick ejaculation first toe around, and ask her if she’s willing to enjoy intercourse a second time: or ask her how long she wants to play with you.
Also give yourself plenty of time and give her foreplay first. If you focus more on her pleasure than yours, it may help you as well.
Lastly, no one is perfect in bed so don’t be so afraid of coming quickly: it means that you are human and “perfectly imperfect”, just like the rest of us.
And from another point of view, if you have a loving partner, you should be able to let yourself go the first time, to please yourself, and then just go for a second, longer bout of lovemaking. You’ll last so much longer before you ejaculate.
And throughout intercourse, don’t think about the pleasure that you will get at the point of climax, but try and stay in the moment – think about how it feels now, and only now, each minute of sex.
Other men contributed their viewpoints when we published this man’s email and our reply.
Question – I have the same problem! I ejaculate less than one minute after I enter my partner’s vagina!
The best way of controlling premature ejaculation for me seems to be masturbating to the point of ejaculation then stopping and going again a minute or two. This “calms me down” – I’d rather not use ointments or pills, it would make me feel more incapable than I already feel.
Answers –
- I tried the squeeze technique, but it doesn’t really work for me, I may last little longer but it’s not long enough for my girl to have an orgasm, when she’s really into it I have to tell her to hurry up and orgasm before I do, but I want us to enjoy it longer. I’m really close to trying pills also! In the internet porn movies we watch they seem to go on forever, they must be using pills?
- Don’t worry about the porn on the internet and those movies. Those guys are picked because they can go a long time. Also, they have probably had several orgasms that day, causing them to be slower.
- On top of that, they have sex for their career, so they probably aren’t nearly as likely to be over-excited or nervous as you or I. Their problem is more likely getting to orgasm and having an ejaculation, premature or otherwise. (How true this is: they often have a severe case of sexual dysfunction and great difficulty ejaculating.)
- It’s not surprising to see that so many responses to a question about how to control PE suggest the use of drugs to solve the problem. But what happens if you go off the drugs? Right back where you started… Do you really want to rely on drugs the rest of your life to enjoy sex? This route of instant gratification is not the best one in my opinion. To each his own, however.
- I had premature ejaculation most of my life. But no longer! I learned to control it and this has changed my life. The key to getting over it is retraining your mind so you don’t expect to ejaculate so quickly. Men get too excited when they anticipate their orgasm, which they expect to have quickly due to the sexual responses they have learned in the past, often when masturbating (i.e. trying to ejaculate as quickly as possible). You simply need to train your brain and penis to last longer or find some negative reinforcements at the time you feel the urge to ejaculate.
Question: “I need to know what to do. My boyfriend has a problem with premature ejaculation. How would other men like their partner to approach the question?
“Although I am experienced, and he has been in other relationships, he lasts no longer than a minute before he ejaculates. He claims that the reason is that I get him too excited! As if it was my fault. I hate the fact that he spurts after no more than sixty seconds and he doesn’t seem to be very interested in doing anything about controlling it.”
Answer: Well, if you wanted to turn to drugs for a cure, there are several anti-depressants which have the side effect of inhibiting ejaculation.
Of course you’d need a good doctor to prescribe them for you, and you would have to explain that you wanted them to prevent premature ejaculation rather than depression, but that should be possible.
Sometimes these drugs actually stop ejaculation altogether, and sometimes they make a man lose his erection, in which case you might want to try combining them with Viagra.
However, the real problem underlying this may be his ego. It’s very hard for men to admit that they have a problems where making love is concerned, and especially when they don’t know what to do about it.
Your challenge is to approach the subject of stopping premature ejaculation in a way that doesn’t seem confrontational or emotional. One way of looking at this is to talk about how much you enjoy sex with him.
If you talk about this in a non-confrontational way, he will be much more likely to accept what you say and get the appropriate treatment.
Above all, don’t accuse him of being selfish and only thinking of himself. That will lead to disaster!
I also have to ask you how much you are contributing to the problem by not stopping him from having sex with you in such an unsatisfactory way.
Sure, you say you are afraid of hurting his feelings, but on the other hand you have a right to an enjoyable experience in bed, and you are in a relationship, so you have a right to expect him to communicate with you about everything, not just what suits him.
As far as his premature ejaculation is concerned, I sense he may be treating you as a sex object and using you for his pleasure – brief though that appears to be. If so, he needs to start thinking of how he can make lovemaking better for you.
And maybe you need to consider making it less easy for him to have intercourse: he’s young and full of sexuality, and no doubt happy to ejaculate inside you every time he gets the chance, with or without thinking about your pleasure.
Try telling him that you expect him to start work on lasting longer, preventing premature ejaculation, and that if he doesn’t then you will be treating yourself to a bit of masturbatory pleasure, and he can do the same.
Question from a reader: “Although I have been having sex for 13 years, and I am now 29 and happily married with children, I have a fairly serious problem, in that I have never been able to last longer than a minute or two in bed. Has anyone out there any effective treatments for rapid ejaculation? Are there any drug treatments that work, for example?”
Answer: “If you have a co-operative doctor, he or she may prescribe an SSRI anti-depressant which can control premature ejaculation. In fact this drug treatment has been prescribed for that very purpose.
“But how about taking a different approach? Instead of looking for a drug treatment, why not spend more time arousing your partner with foreplay and oral pleasure? Women take longer to arouse, but when they are aroused can reach orgasm just as easily as men. The difference is that they need longer stimulation to get to the edge of orgasm.
Therefore, if you spend time arousing your partner before you enter her, she may be at the edge of orgasm and be ready to enjoy her orgasm when you are.
That way, you can put your penis in her vagina, continue to stimulate her clitoris and you may both come together. If you get the the timing right, it won’t matter if you last one minute or ten, and you’ll have the pleasure of coming at the same time, which is fantastic – a real treat!”
Delayed ejaculation may also be encountered from time to time. The opposite of premature ejaculation, this insidious and problematic issue can cause couples to fail to get pregnant, can reduce a man’s self-esteem, and make a woman feel very unattractive.
Question: “I am forty and I still come far too quickly. While we both enjoy sex, and my partner always comes with oral sex before I enter her, she would definitely like me to last longer. Any suggestions?”
Answer: “To stop premature ejaculation after it has been a problem for so long may not be easy, but I think you have already heard all the answers.
Drug treatment can be effective with SSRI, then there is the stop/start method, in which you get to the edge of orgasm then stop masturbating, oral sex or intercourse before you come.
Then there are some men who recommend herbal treatments, there is hypnosis therapy, which I have used myself, and then there is the “non-treatment” described in the last answer in which you have sex and time intercourse so that you both come at the same time after penetration, whether this is one minute or ten.
If you are serious about stopping your quick climax I have to add that you may find it slows down naturally as you get older and your testosterone drops. That may be one advantage of getting older!
Finally, try hypnosis treatment. Go to a professional hypnotist if you can stand the embarrassment (though in fact it need not be embarrassing if he is a man and a competent therapist), or try self-hypnosis treatment instead to help you learn methods to last longer in bed for men. You can get treatment CDs & MP3s easily from the internet.”